Grim Friday ahead

It's looking like it could be a grim Friday. With Asian markets falling in the wake of Wall Street's overnight drop - the Nikkei closed down more than 3% - London shares were always likely to struggle. And so far they are.

At one point this morning there were no risers in the FTSE 100, but things have picked up slightly since then and the leading index is off its worst levels, down 66.4 points at 5700.0 after hitting 5662.5.

All eyes will be on the US job numbers due this afternoon, following yesterday's record repossession figures in the final quarter of 2007. Non-farm payrolls are expected to show a rise of 25,000 but the numbers have been known to confound expectations.

There is even talk in the foreign exchange markets of a possible emergency US rate cut later today.

Sentiment has not been helped by problems with the Dutch subsidiary of US private equity group Carlyle, which said it may face cashflow problems due to its exposure to US mortgage backed securities. The Dutch company's shares have now been suspended. Carlyle says its exposure to the business is $150m in the form of a credit facility.

On the company front, pubs group JD Wetherspoon is down nearly 10% after it revealed a cautious outlook for its second half.